How do you determine the speed of a free falling object?

Answer 1

I think that you also need to take air friction into account, because any object will reach a "terminal" velocity.
If you don't care about this, you only need to know how long, t, it's been falling, and the speed will be t*9.8 m/s (where t is time in seconds).

I think the terminal velocity of a human is about 120 mph. The reason I know that is that vertical wind tunnels, used for sky diving practice, have the wind speed set to 120 mph.

Answer 2

I don't think any of the answers were all that correct so far. Acceleration is distance/second^2. On earth it is 9.8 m/s^2. Velocity is distance/second.

So to get a velocity from acceleration you multiple the acceleration by time.

So the time (t) times the acceleration (a) gives the velocity (v).

On Earth, the speed of a freefalling object as a function of time is
v(t) = a*t.

In terms of air friction, which leads to a terminal velocity. I feel your question was referring to the basic principle of v = at. I assume you're taking Physics 1, and that type of question rarely takes friction into account.

Answer 3

The instantaneous velocity of any object, regardless of mass and ignoring air resistance, is given by the acceleration of gravity multiplied by how long it has been falling, namely v = a * t.

Answer 4

Assuming that there is no friction;

The speed at any point is determined by noting the time for the body to fall up to that point.

V = g t. where g is the acceleration due to gravity.
-----------------------------------------Or---------------------------
The speed at any point can be determined by measuring the distance of that point from the initial position.

V = square root of 2g H.

Thus either by measuring the time or by measuring the distance of travel we can calculate its velocity.

Answer 5

Free falling is measured 9.8m/s2. Every second times by 9.8

Answer 6

you can calculate it based of the acceleration of gravity

g=9.81 m/s^2

v(final)^2=v(original)^2 + 2*gravity*distance traveled

Answer 7

in basic 9.8 meters per second, squared.

first second, 9.8
second second 9.8 * 9.8
third 9.8*9.8*9.8
and so on
up to the max speed of 1 g.
of course air friction will slow you some
depends on the level of science you are looking at.

Answer 8

a = 32ft/s^2

you would also need to factor in air resistance

Answer 9

32' per second , per second squared

Answer 10

by knowing it's mass, height and of course acceleration due to gravity..